A Homemade Life Book Review

I found this while I was wandering around the library looking for what I was going to read next.  A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table by Molly Wizenberg was not a disappointment.  It was like reading the best cookbook you could possibly imagine.  There were only probably 4-5 recipes that I would actually make but the writing in the rest of the book was so entertaining.

When Molly Wizenberg's father died of cancer, everyone told her to go easy on herself, to hold off on making any major decisions for a while. But when she tried going back to her apartment in Seattle and returning to graduate school, she knew it wasn't possible to resume life as though nothing had happened. So she went to Paris, a city that held vivid memories of a childhood trip with her father, of early morning walks on the cobbled streets of the Latin Quarter and the taste of her first pain au chocolat. She was supposed to be doing research for her dissertation, but more often, she found herself peering through the windows of chocolate shops, trekking across town to try a new pâtisserie, or tasting cheeses at outdoor markets, until one evening when she sat in the Luxembourg Gardens reading cookbooks until it was too dark to see, she realized that her heart was not in her studies but in the kitchen.

At first, it wasn't clear where this epiphany might lead. Like her long letters home describing the details of every meal and market, Molly's blog Orangette started out merely as a pleasant pastime. But it wasn't long before her writing and recipes developed an international following. Every week, devoted readers logged on to find out what Molly was cooking, eating, reading, and thinking, and it seemed she had finally found her passion. But the story wasn't over: one reader in particular, a curly-haired, food-loving composer from New York, found himself enchanted by the redhead in Seattle, and their email correspondence blossomed into a long-distance romance.

In A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table, Molly Wizenberg recounts a life with the kitchen at its center. From her mother's pound cake, a staple of summer picnics during her childhood in Oklahoma, to the eggs she cooked for her father during the weeks before his death, food and memories are intimately entwined. You won't be able to decide whether to curl up and sink into the story or to head straight to the market to fill your basket with ingredients for Cider-Glazed Salmon and Pistachio Cake with Honeyed Apricots.

I hope that you check out this book because it really goes through every part of her life and how food played a role.  There is a chapter of the book for each experience followed by a recipe or two that she had talked about during the chapter.  There are many chapters that I wasn't sure where the recipe was going to go because there was a lot going on but she always brought it back to the recipe.  The last chapter and my favorite recipe was the chocolate wedding cake that they made for their own wedding.  I really enjoyed it and if you think that you might enjoy the most readable cookbook, check this book out at your local library or bookstore.  I promise that you won't be disappointed in the wonderful stories and great writing!!

The one recipe that my husband would like me to make is the Coconut Macaroons with chocolate ganache (found on page 94) or on her website (although a little different recipe) here.